The Water Cooler

Science, Technology, Business, and Politics

Wednesday, September 29, 2004

What the Bubble Got Right: "I had a front row seat for the Internet Bubble, because I worked at Yahoo during 1998 and 1999. One day, when the stock was trading around $200, I sat down and calculated what I thought the price should be. The answer I got was $12. I went to the next cubicle and told my friend Trevor. 'Twelve!' he said. He tried to sound indignant, but he didn't quite manage it. He knew as well as I did that our valuation was crazy."

Tuesday, September 28, 2004

paidContent.org's ContentNext Series: How Media Reacts To New Media: It is arguable that the growth of no industry has been more dependent on external invention than the media business. New technologies and techniques - the phonograph, radio, motion pictures, television - invariably emanate from outside the creative community of the moment. And invariably - ironic though it always seems in retrospect -- each newly minted format or distribution mechanism that arises to propel the culture's best intellectual output into peoples' lives with new efficiency - creating powerful new revenue streams in the process - has been fought or ignored by the creators and content businesses of the moment.